Differentiation of Self and Clinicians’ Perceptions of Client Sexual Behavior as “Problematic”

Contemporary Family Therapy volume 39, pages207–219(2017)Cite this article

Abstract

Clients regularly come to psychotherapy wanting to discuss sexual concerns. Clinicians (across mental health professions) often lack training and comfort in addressing sexual concerns. Empirically, it is still unclear how clinicians manage their own level of comfort, values, and implicit beliefs about client characteristics associated with sexuality. Differentiation of self may be a useful construct for understanding the influence of (dis)comfort with sexuality, value commitments, and client characteristics (e.g., gender, marital status, exclusivity) on clinicians’ perceptions of client sexual behavior; though no study to date has empirically explored this possibility. To test the role of differentiation of self, participants, both licensed mental health professionals (n = 89) and clinicians-in-training (n = 109) were recruited from across the United States (M age = 36.40; 83.8% female; 80.3% White). Participants were asked to respond to a vignette about a client presenting with sexual behavior concerns and then completed a series of measures on differentiation of self, comfort with sexuality, personal values, and demographic items. As hypothesized, participants’ level of differentiation had nonlinear and linear conditional effects on how participants rated the client’s sexual behavior described in case vignettes. Implications emphasize the role for differentiation of self in clinicians’ management of sexual comfort, personal values, and client characteristics when encountering clients’ sexual concerns.

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Author information

Affiliations

  1. Department of Family and Community Medicine, Medical Family Therapy Program, Saint Louis University, 3700 Lindell Blvd, Ste 1101, St. Louis, MO, 63108, USA

    Katie M. Heiden-Rootes

  2. Department of Human Development and Family Science, East Carolina University, RW 309 Rivers Building, Greenville, NC, 27858, USA

    Andrew S. Brimhall

  3. Bethel University, 3900 Bethel Dr., St. Paul, MN, 55112, USA

    Peter J. Jankowski

  4. Private Practice, Nixa, MO, 65714, USA

    Geoffrey T. Reddick

Authors
  1. Katie M. Heiden-Rootes
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  2. Andrew S. Brimhall
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  3. Peter J. Jankowski
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  4. Geoffrey T. Reddick
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Katie M. Heiden-Rootes.

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All authors have no conflicts of interest related to this study.

Ethical Approval

This study was a human subject research project approved by the Saint Louis University IRB (see IRB protocol #22809).

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We received informed consent by all participants as part of the web-based survey. A copy of the informed consent can be found in the IRB protocol and I can provide you with a copy to review.

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Heiden-Rootes, K.M., Brimhall, A.S., Jankowski, P.J. et al. Differentiation of Self and Clinicians’ Perceptions of Client Sexual Behavior as “Problematic”. Contemp Fam Ther 39, 207–219 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10591-017-9412-3

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Keywords

  • Differentiation of self
  • Sexual comfort
  • Value commitments
  • Problem conceptualization
  • Clinicians’ perceptions